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The Texas Supreme Court ruled that Dr. Larry Gentilello's internal warnings about possible billing fraud did not qualify him for whistle-blower protection under state law.

The Texas Supreme Court has dismissed on technical grounds a UT Southwestern Medical Center trauma surgeon’s nearly six-year claim that he was demoted in retaliation for alleging billing fraud and lax resident supervision.

In an opinion issued late last week, Justice Don R. Willett wrote on the court’s behalf that the Texas Whistleblower Act protects employees who report potential wrongdoing to an “appropriate law enforcement authority.”

But Gentilello had warned his supervisor, the chairman of UTSW’s surgery department. The justices concluded the chairman, Dr. Robert Rege, lacked the kind of regulatory or policing power described in the act.

“This is a legislatively-mandated legal classification, one tightly drawn, and we cannot judicially loosen it,” according to the opinion, which I uploaded at this post’s end. “Other states protect purely internal whistle-blowing, but under our Legislature’s narrower view, a whistleblower cannot reasonably believe his supervisor is an appropriate law-enforcement authority if the supervisor’s power extends no further than ensuring the governmental body itself complies with the law.”

The Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of Gentilello’s allegations. The decision overturned those of two lower courts, which had let Gentilello proceed despite legal shields that generally make entities like UTSW immune to such lawsuits.